Weapons ready, they moved down the corridor, looking for stairs leading down.
“Sir!”
Amir Taleh looked up from the maps he’d been studying and saw Kazemi’s agonized face. “Yes, Captain?”
“The Americans have broken through my defences. They are inside the building.” The young aide swallowed hard. “You and the others must leave this place before it is too late!”
“Agreed.” Taleh nodded, still staggered by the speed of the American attack. Who could have dreamed that they would demonstrate such audacity? Still, all was not yet lost. He could regain control over his invasion forces at another of the alternate command posts. He turned to his deputy. “Assemble the senior staff, Hashemi.”
Most were already prepared, clutching briefcases stuffed full of hastily gathered maps and documents. Surrounded by Taleh’s personal bodyguards, the group hurried toward the nearest staircase.
Thorn crouched at the top of the stairs, watching Diaz get set. They’d heard the clatter of boots and the metallic clink of weapons drawing closer for the last several seconds. Whoever was coming up had almost reached the bend in the stairs.
He nodded sharply and his lips formed the unspoken command, “Now!”
The sergeant major yanked the pin out of the fragmentation grenade he was holding and tossed it down the stairwell.
Taleh heard something clattering down the stairs from above and froze. A small cylindrical shape bounced into view, rolling toward them. His eyes widened in shocked recognition.
Without hesitation, Captain Farhad Kazemi threw himself forward onto the grenade just before it went off.
WHUMMP. Thorn felt concussion punch into his lungs, and buried his face against his arms to shield his eyes from the smoke and debris billowing up out of the stairwell. Then he was on his feet, charging downward with Diaz at his side.
They rounded the bend.
Iranian officers and enlisted men jammed the staircase in a tangled knot. Some were bleeding. All of them were dazed. Only one, though, was dead the victim of his own sacrifice.
Thorn opened fire with his submachine gun, sweeping from left to right. Diaz took the other side. Each burst sent one or more Iranians tumbling down the stairs. It was a methodical, mechanical slaughter. Those who were armed were too closely crowded together to use their own weapons effectively.
He felt a single bullet tear a burning gash across his upper left arm and shot the man who’d winged him. His finger eased on the trigger. He couldn’t see any more targets any more men to kill.
Then Thorn spotted movement near Diaz out of the corner of his eye. He started to spin in that direction. He was too late. He was too slow.
A man in a blood-spattered uniform reared up from the stairs and fired a pistol into Roberto Diaz at point-blank range, aiming upward. The bullet caught the short, stocky sergeant major in the throat. He toppled backward with a surprised look frozen forever on his face.
“You son of a bitch!” Thorn squeezed off a burst that slammed the Iranian back against the wall.
“Oh, Jesus.” He knelt beside his friend, fumbling desperately for a field dressing. But TOW Diaz was beyond his help.
“Peter…”
Thorn spun back toward the man he’d shot toward the man who had once been another friend.
General Amir Taleh stared up at him, breathing heavily, bleeding from several wounds in the chest and stomach.
Thorn stared down in contempt. “You bastard! I trusted you. I looked up to you. I thought you were a man of honor not a god damned terrorist who would kill women and children!”
Taleh’s face twisted in sudden pain. “What I did to your country, Peter … You must understand. It was war.” “No, sir,” Thorn said coldly, “it was murder.” He raised his submachine gun, aimed carefully at Taleh’s head, and fired three more shots one after the other.
Four UH-1N Hueys flew low across the Iranian capital, dodging over rooftops and around taller buildings to throw off any ground fire. They were heading south. A tiny, rocketarrned AH-6 gunship paced them, ready to pounce at the first sign of trouble.
Aboard the lead helicopter, Colonel Peter Thorn sat silently beside a covered stretcher. Unwilling to leave the Iranians anything to desecrate, the soldiers of the NEMESIS force had brought their dead out with them. He shivered and stared down at his shaking hands.
His casualties had been high far higher than anything he had imagined. Nearly half of his sixty-man assault force had been killed or wounded. Medics were working frantically in the rear of each overcrowded helicopter, trying to keep the worst hurt alive long enough to reach a hospital.
Thorn felt a hand on his shoulder and looked over into Hamir Pahesh’s sympathetic face.
“I am sorry, my friend. I know that many brave men died in this battle,” the Afghan said simply. Then he shrugged. “But you have made your enemies shake in terror. You have thwarted their wickedness. That is worth much.”
Pahesh smiled shyly. “And now we go home, eh?“ The Afghan’s bravery had earned him the right to a new country.
“Yes, now we go home.” Thorn slumped back in his seat, his eyes already closing. Home to America, he thought wearily. Home to Helen Gray.
Behind him, the fires set by Tomahawks lit the night sky.
Helen Gray woke suddenly from a restless, pain-filled sleep, hearing a change in the tone of the television in her room. She’d left it on for company during the long nights. She opened her eyes.
Live satellite pictures showed a burning city. “Reports from the Pentagon now confirm that American Delta Force commandos attacked and destroyed the Tehran headquarters of General Amir Taleh early yesterday morning. Although officials claim the mission achieved its primary objectives, they also admit that casualties were extremely heavy…”
Helen sat rigid. Like her, Peter Thorn led his men from the front. She held her breath for a moment, fighting down her fears for his safety. She might recover. But what about Peter? She blinked away sudden tears. What if he had been killed? How could she live without him?
A wire-service photo of a trim, bearded Iranian flashed onto the screen. “According to U.S. intelligence sources, General Amir Taleh was the man directly responsible for orchestrating the bloody terrorist campaign that has ravaged this country since early November.”
The images shifted to a series of maps and black-and white satellite photos shot from high overhead. “In a related development, White House sources have released intelligence information showing that the Iranian-sponsored terrorist campaign was part of a much larger plan to invade Saudi Arabia and, ultimately, to dominate the entire Persian Gulf. If so, the Delta Force raid has smashed Tehran’s grand imperial design. There are growing reports of bitter factional fighting in Iran’s major cities as various groups struggle for control over the now-leaderless Islamic Republic.”
The television picture cut back to a somber announcer. “The President is expected to address the nation at six P.M., eastern standard time.”
Helen lay in bed, watching the pictures flooding in from halfway around the world desperately eager for more details. She shifted impatiently. If only her foot would stop itching…
She took her eyes off the television and looked down. Her foot itched.
Her damaged nerves might be healing. The doctors had warned her that a full recovery would take months, maybe even years, of rigorous physical therapy, but this was at least a start a promise that she could regain the mobility and freedom she feared had been lost forever.